BROOKLYN, NY, October 21 — “Justice for Kyam Livingston — killed in a Brooklyn cell” echoed down the cold, darkening, windswept street outside 120 Schermerhorn St. here today. This is the courthouse that holds the local Central Booking, backing on to the Brooklyn House of Detention. The gathering of more than 120 chanting people was multi-racial, young and old, men and women. Although the street was dark and cold, the fire of the words burned against the walls of Central Booking.
A number of cops stood in front of the courthouse’s wide door as the chants continued. Several speakers talked about Kyam Livingston who had called out for medical attention for over seven hours from her cell. She received none and died there on a bench with only the other detainees to help and comfort her. That’s what gave her mother’s words such strength.
Holding up the urn with Kyam’s ashes, between anguished sobs, she told the story of how her daughter’s cries for help were spurned by the jailers. Kyam’s son also spoke about his growing understanding of the system that could callously do this to his mother. One young man emceed the gathering while two people kept the chants going between speeches.
The first hearing of the case against the City occurred in federal court earlier in the day. The City outrageously refuses to hand over the surveillance tapes of events in the cell the night Kyam died, or the names of the cops on duty at the jailhouse. Instead they questioned the family about Kyam as a person, as though she was the offending party. The arrogance and callousness of the system becomes more apparent every day.
This is where Kyam’s son learned a lot more about how the working class is officially oppressed. According to the official rules, Kyam should have been given medical attention when she was first in distress. Instead, all she and her cellmates received from the cops was the notice to “shut the f*** up or we’ll lose your paperwork.”
Kyam’s mother could not contain her sorrow. She walked up the steps between the cops and right into the courthouse where everyone could see her from the street. She tightly held the urn with her daughter’s ashes. She then walked out between the security people, went to the microphone and spoke of taking her daughter out of the jail. “Now you’re free,” her mother said. There were few dry eyes among the gathered supporters.
A teacher who works with the Justice for Shantel Davis Committee spoke, linking the system responsible for both deaths. Later another speaker told the group that the “elephant in the room is racism,” and that racism must be fought constantly. He led the chant, “Racism means, fight back!” which everyone took up. Another speaker challenged the security guards standing on the steps to think about what had happened, and about how people are treated inside that building. Other chants and speakers demanded release of the tapes, the cops’ names and for a thorough investigation of conditions inside the jail.
The Justice for Kyam Livingston Committee will continue to be active and hold demonstrations on the 21st of every month, the monthly anniversary of her death. The committee’s growth and those involved are a good sign of people refusing to accept the pat answers that capitalism gives us for the tragedies it causes. The sale of CHALLENGE during this demonstration was another good sign. The struggle may be long, but the goal is our future.
SOUTH TEL-AVIV, October 13 — Hundreds of workers of various ethnicities — Jews, Palestinians and African refugees — marched in the south of the city against the horrible neglect of their neighborhoods by the racist, capitalist city hall. They called for the dissolution of the “ghettos,” for an end to racial segregation and for power for the local residents. This working-class rally came a mere week after a racist march by fascists, also in south Tel-Aviv, against the “infiltrator problem” (what racists call the African refugees, who escaped genocide in Darfur or murderous tyranny in Eritrea.)
While the fascist thugs do the bosses’ bidding by dividing workers and blaming the victims for the horrid conditions of the working-class neighborhoods, today the working class fought back and placed the blame on the real culprits: city hall and its capitalist masters. The workers came in high spirits with signs and drums, and the cops didn’t dare to obstruct their way. Progressive Labor Party distributed an anti-racist flyer, as well as CHALLENGEs in Hebrew, Arabic and English, which were well-received.
The mayors of Tel-Aviv have been neglecting the southern part of the city, which is mostly working-class (both Jewish and Arab), for decades. While fat-cat mayor Ron Huldai authorizes the construction of fancy high-rise towers for the rich, the south suffers from failing infrastructure, bad public transit, pollution and massive crime. The area around the central bus station has a high concentration of drug pushers, striptease halls and brothels, where, in many cases, human trafficking victims are being exploited. Muggings of workers and rape of working-class women by criminals are commonplace. This has existed for decades, while the cops do nothing. The sewage runs in the streets and rats abound. All of this contrasts to the fancy, northern parts of town, where the mostly Ashkenazi (European Jewish) small-scale bosses and bourgeoisie dwell; there crimes are solved or moved to the south, and infrastructures are good.
In the early 2000s, thousands of workers fleeing East Africa went north to Egypt, where they were murdered by Egyptian soldiers (who, according to testimonies we have heard, get an evening off duty for every refugee they kill). Others are kidnapped by local criminals in Sinai and held for ransom while being tortured. So they flee further north to Israel, where the government intensifies these racist attacks by busing them straight from the border to the already overcrowded working-class neighborhoods of South Tel-Aviv. They rarely get work permits and are forced into the underground low-wage economy.
These refugees work at starvation wages for local contractors, who pay them as little as $3-$4.5 USD per hour, about half the minimum wage. They are further exploited by slumlords, who pack ten of them into a tiny apartment at high rent. Survival “crime” is common, as many refugees must steal in order to eat.
But of course the bosses’ government blames the refugees! The local fascist politicians accuse them of spreading diseases and crime, call them racist names. Slum residents are being taught by the government to blame the refugees for the neglect of their neighborhoods. But things are changing.
A working-class fighter whom PLP knows and used to hold strong racist ideas, said to us at the demonstration, “it’s a shame not many people from the slums come to this kind of demonstrations. It’s because of racism.” She is beginning to see that racism is the enemy of the working class.
Multi-racial working-class unity is the real way to change how South Tel-Aviv is being neglected by the government of the rich. By building working-class consciousness and eventually, building our revolutionary Party, we stand a chance of turning things upside down. When the communists liberated China 64 years ago this month, they ended slums, freed and rehabilitated the prostitutes, shot the pimps, pushers and slumlords and eliminated opium dens. For three decades they struggled to build a society free from those ills. While their achievements were eventually reversed, we can learn from their experience and build ourselves a new world from the ashes of the old. Join us!
PARIS, November 6 — A new wave of layoffs has hit France, where official unemployment is 5,473,000 (19.3 percent). Some are due to companies going under in the continuing Great Recession, while others come at profitable companies that want to boost their profits even more. It all underscores the anarchy of capitalism, where capitalists produce goods and services to make a profit — not to satisfy the needs of the working class — while millions suffer from joblessness and privation.
Five Companies Announce Layoffs
Fagor-Brandt, Europe’s fifth-largest housing appliances manufacturer, went bankrupt, dumping 5,700 workers worldwide, (1,800 in France, 2,000 in Spain). French union leaders pleaded for a French government bailout of the French part of the company, while throwing Spain’s workers into the streets.
The union misleaders follow a nationalist road hoping to win crumbs from “your own government.” This is why communists build international unity to fight the bosses and their governments.
Crédit Immobilier de France (CIF), a small bank specializing in home loans is winding down the company, laying off 1,500 while 700 will continue to manage the bank’s outstanding loans. CIF could have continued making home loans to workers, but the French Finance Ministry intends to grab at least part of its 2.4 billion euros in capital (US$3.2 billion) to help the cash-strapped French government pay off its sovereign debt to the world’s finance capitalists. Under capitalism, homes for workers are less important than cash for financiers.
The Alstom corporation announced at least 1,300 layoffs, mainly in Europe. The corporation is expected to make a net profit of 361 million euros (US$487 million) this year.
Telecoms operator Alcatel Lucent announced 10,000 layoffs worldwide, including 881 in France in 2014. More than 900 other jobs in France will be impacted by internal re-organization and the closure of some sites. On October 15, Alcatel Lucent workers demonstrated in Paris, Rennes and Toulouse to protest the planned layoffs. In 2012, the corporation lost 1.3 billion euros net (US$1.75 billion).
The Kering corporation plans 700 layoffs, 21 percent of the 3,300 workers at its mail order subsidiary, La Redoute, in northern France, in a region already hard-hit by the economic crisis. Kering plans to sell La Redoute, as the down-sizing makes it a more attractive purchase. About 6,000 jobs are linked directly or indirectly to Le Redoute.
In the first half of 2013 Kering’s profits rose 582 million euros (US$785 million). CEO François-Henri Pinault’s salary in 2011 was 3,000,000 euros (US$4,000,000). His father’s fortune totals 8.1 billion euros (US$10.9 billion).
Socialist Government’s Capitalist Response to Unemployment
The “lesser evil” Socialist government has three “answers” to rising unemployment: (1) bribe companies into not laying off workers; (2) “disappear” unemployed workers from the statistics; and (3) allow French capitalists to super-exploit workers from other countries under slave-labor conditions. Of course, none of this will solve the problem. As Karl Marx analyzed in “Capital” long ago, capitalism’s boom-bust cycle inevitably produces periods of mass unemployment. He demonstrated that even in the boom times capitalism produces the exact amount of unemployment needed to optimize profits.
Disappearing the Unemployed
Meanwhile, the government will be robbing the jobless of unemployment benefits with its “harmonization” of the rules, which includes a detailed list of the documentary evidence a worker must provide to justify missing an appointment or be struck off the rolls. Every month, around 41,000 workers are struck down, 90 percent for missing an appointment.
Super-Exploiting Immigrant Workers
Under European Union regulations, French bosses can pay social security to an immigrant worker’s home country (within the EU) at the local rate, which is one-sixth of the French rate. In 2011, French bosses imported an estimated 300,000 immigrant workers from Eastern Europe, mainly employed in the building trades, agriculture and transport. These workers are mercilessly exploited by the bosses, some becoming virtual slaves. The bosses withhold a large part of their wages for transport and housing costs, force them to work up to 60 hours a week without paying overtime, provide substandard housing and confiscate their passports.
This cheap, or even slave, labor divides the working class. Unemployed workers are told that “cheap foreign workers are stealing our jobs.” This partly explains the election success of the fascist National Front (see CHALLENGE, 11/13). It also drives down wages and benefits for all workers. In addition, the bosses make super-profits on the immigrant workers. The workers’ trump card is anti-racist international solidarity and their ability to stop production (see box).
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International Unity Wins Immigrant Workers’ Strike
Thirty-five undocumented, mainly Egyptian workers shut down the AF-Interlog plant, with the active assistance of the other, documented workers. AF-Interlog is a subsidiary of an Italian company, which is itself the subsidiary of an Australian corporation. The workers are immigrants from Italy. AF-Interlog repairs pallets for Coca-Cola and the retail giant Carrefour.
The company ordered the workers not to talk to the trade union steward who helps undocumented workers obtain papers. When they disobeyed, the company told the workers they had to produce papers or they would be sent back to Italy, where they knew they would be laid off.
When the workers struck, the bosses immediately contacted the prefecture (the local representative of the central government), who also sent the workers a letter demanding papers.
The workers held out, forcing the company to fill out paperwork retroactively, and forcing the prefecture to allow the workers to file for documents allowing them to live and work in France.
This inspiring success reveals the power of international unity and organized, combined action. And it points the way to the ultimate struggle: overthrowing both the bosses and their governments through communist revolution, in order to create a society where we all work collectively (without unemployment) to produce what our class needs.
Competition for maximum profits is a law of capitalism. Capitalists fight to gain a profit advantage over their rivals, both within a country and between countries. Ultimately the fight between the two antagonistic classes — workers and bosses — is the main determinant of world events. However, currently — as CHALLENGE has correctly pointed out — due to the weakness of workers’ class struggle, and especially the absence of a mass communist-led working class, inter-imperialist rivalry has governed world affairs.
Inevitably the capitalists settle their differences by going to war, which occurred on a world scale twice between 1914 and 1945. What drives them to war is the competition in the economic sphere, for markets, resources and masses of cheap labor. Economic wars lead inevitably to shooting wars.
Much of this has been reflected in proxy wars in the Middle East and Southeast Asia, as well as in U.S. rulers’ direct invasions (Iraq and Afghanistan), partly to control energy supplies and pipelines. In addition, however, this rivalry is also intensifying in another economic war, specifically in the world’s auto industry.
From the 1980s until 2011, the French automaker Peugeot was selling 455,000 cars per year in Iran, one-third of the country’s auto market, all assembled in Iran from parts shipped by Peugeot from Vesoul, France. Then on June 3, nine days before the Iranian elections, Barack Obama signed an executive order authorizing the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury to take sanctions against any company that furnishes or has already furnished “goods and services” to the “automobile sector in Iran.” This would have a direct effect on Peugeot. However, Obama’s decree was careful not to forbid delivery to Iran of completely built cars, opening the market to General Motors and other U.S. automakers through their foreign subsidiaries. Since June auto manufacturers have been anticipating this opening of the Iranian market, estimated at 1,500,000 cars a year.
Meanwhile, Korean manufacturer Daewoo is preparing to be the star at Teheran’s auto show this month. And guess who holds a 47 percent stake in Daewoo? None other than GM. After Obama moved to bail out GM from bankruptcy, he now helps GM in its profit war with its rivals.
But how does this attempt by GM to sell cars in Iran square with the ongoing fight between the U.S. and Iran over the latter’s nuclear ambitions, which seemingly has been leading to military confrontation? Such a war would certainly damage GM’s ability to enter the Iranian auto market. A potential resolution to this contradiction could result from what appears to be a new outlook within the U.S. ruling class on what to do about Iran.
On November 4, the New York Times — chief mouthpiece of the main financial wing of the U.S. ruling class — published three items which seemed to fly in the face of the idea that war with Iran is inevitable and might be prompting the attempt of U.S. automakers to win a goodly share of Iran’s auto market.
An editorial — “Congress Can Help on Iran” — made the case that the situation is moving towards “a broader rapprochement” between Iran and the West and therefore this is not the time for Congress to impose even stricter sanctions on Iran because they “could sabotage the best opportunity in years for a peaceful resolution” of a nuclear agreement.
The second item was an op-ed piece entitled, “Talk to Iran, It Works” by Ryan Crocker, former U.S. ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan and dean of the Bush School of Government at Texas A & M. He maintains that “talks with Iran have succeeded before and they can succeed again.” He then reviews the two ruling classes’ cooperation right after 9/11 when Iran gave “extremely valuable” information “showing the Taliban’s troop strength and positions just before American military action began,” an invasion of which Iran was “a strong proponent.” Ambassador Crocker says he “made agreements on various security issues” with Iran but the cooperation ended when Bush gave his “axis of evil” speech in early 2002, indicting Iran, Iraq and N. Korea.
The third article — headlined “Iran’s Top Leader and U.S. Counter Criticism of Talks” — reported on current nuclear talks with Iran in Geneva. Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei, while pessimistic on an agreement, nevertheless “moved to quiet hard-liners in his country by expressing support for his negotiating team” when the diplomatic initiative had been attacked by “conservative clerics and military commanders.”
Now all this doesn’t necessarily mean that there will be an agreement and that there won’t be a U.S. military clash with Iran, but it also seems to indicate that there are sentiments in the U.S. ruling class that might want such an agreement. This would certainly coincide with Obama’s actions to help GM and other U.S. automakers reap a profit harvest from Iran’s potential 1,500,000 auto sales.
However, France has now held up an agreement in an attempt to lead Mideast countries opposed to Iran — Israel, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates. France has signed lucrative contracts with the latter two, including a $5 billion contract containing delivery of ground-to-air missiles to the Saudis and aircraft to Qatar. (Their position has been supported by U.S. right-wingers John McCain and the Wall Street Journal who proclaim “Vive la France.”)
So French rulers’ hold-up of an agreement with Iran may indicate a willingness to sacrifice some of Peugeot’s profits in Iran in exchange for becoming a leading arms supplier in the Mideast.
With negotiations over Iran’s nuclear ambitions in the background, the fight over its auto market becomes another factor in what happens among these competing capitalists. Of course, the exploitation of the auto-workers who produce the cars is what enables these bosses to engage in these auto wars. It is only class war between the workers and these bosses that can lead to a revolution dumping the exploiters.
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PL College Conference: Youth Welcome ‘Rising Flames’ of Communist Ideas
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- 14 November 2013 68 hits
BROOKLYN, November 9 — In 1968, guitar virtuoso and songwriter Jimi Hendrix wrote the line, “Look at the sky turn hellfire red…” He was referring to the rising flames of black workers’ rebellions in major U.S. cities after nonviolent struggle seemed futile.
In 2013, his words could easily describe the revolutionary excitement felt at the two-day Progressive Labor Party College Conference to Smash Imperialism. Some participants came from the rally against the repression of student fighters [see front page] and greeted communist ideas and practices as a welcome alternative to the fascism we experience daily on campus.
Creeping Fascism and International Fightback
The conference, 60 people strong, boasted a multi-racial crowd from across the U.S., along with others from as far away as Mexico and Switzerland. It was an important step toward building an alliance of students, professors and college workers. It strengthened a new leadership of PL youth while rejuvenating the fighting spirits of more veteran comrades.
The conference took place as attacks on students and faculty have sharpened. From Haiti to Los Angeles to New York City, college campuses are becoming breeding grounds for fascism. This is a period when U.S. bosses, in preparation for war with inter-imperialist rivals like China, can no longer rule in the old way. In their desperate effort to hold on to state power, they must intensify their repression of students and workers. The City University of New York’s reinstallation of the Reserve Officer Training Corps, integrating generals Colin Powell and David Petraeus into the curriculum, is one sign of creeping fascism. Another is the shutdown of student centers, a move that hinders student organizing [see CHALLENGE 11/13].
Many students involved in fightbacks are wondering, Why is this happening now? Another crucial question: Is communism possible? Our conference was a positive move to build confidence in the working class that we can indeed win. Moreover, the workshops used the Marxist method of dialectical materialism to investigate how capitalism is headed not only toward war but also toward its own inevitable decay and death.
Students Passionate About Communism
Many were passionate in opposing racism, sexism, nationalism and other divisions among working people. In workshops and larger gatherings, students demonstrated a serious desire for a renewed movement to change the dark future capitalism has in store for them [see page 6].
A keynote speech by a student leader of the PLP college work reflected the revolutionary optimism mood shared by many. “Capitalism is a system that’s dying and the working class has glimmers of hope. The glimmers are happening in this very room. There are glimmers of hope when we fight back, when we choose the side of communism. We will win! Choose communist revolution and raise that blood-red flag high. Never let it come down!”
In one workshop, a young woman student talked about the role of universities under capitalism. She said she felt targeted by her right-wing professor for openly challenging his backward ideas in class. By the end of the day, she said the conference gave her confidence she wasn’t alone, and that PLP has her back in the struggle against anti-working-class ideas. This student was a shining example of an engaged, vocal and focused thinker, the opposite of the media caricature of apathetic youth.
Comrades from Haiti drafted a sharp solidarity letter about an incident four days earlier, when students faced “hundreds of tear gas canisters…fired by the State Police, and students were passing out around us as rubber bullets as well as live bullets rained down on us.”
The conference promoted a discussion on the importance and use of CHALLENGE in our fightbacks. We expect more students to write for, read, and distribute our revolutionary paper.
The college conference is one step in a long fight against imperialism. We must bring our revolutionary optimism back to our campuses, be they in Switzerland or Indiana. If we do our jobs, the bosses will have a bigger problem than the threats to their control over their oil resources. They’ll be up against an organized, international working class.
